aerial recon of the Kavak airstrip to see if we have a hot LZ.”
Again, she nodded, and noticed her tablet in Brodie’s lap. “What are you reading?”
“Bird porn.”
“Can you sound knowledgeable about birds?”
“I’m CID. I can sound knowledgeable on any subject when I’m playing the part.”
“Give me an example.”
“Okay… If you’re watching a pheasant in full flight at about fifty yards, you lead him by about five feet before you fire.”
Taylor smiled. “What if it’s a guy on a mule who’s firing back? Do you aim for the mule’s ass?”
“As a matter of fact, Ms. Smartass, if cavalry is attacking infantry, the infantry would aim for the horses. The bigger target.”
“You should have used that defense at the inquiry.”
“I just thought of it.”
So, with the pre-mission banter out of the way, he said, “If the airstrip looks hot, we’ll just do an aerial recon of the area, take a few photos to spice up our debrief, then tell Collins to fly us to Bogotá.”
She nodded. Brodie handed her the tablet and she plugged it into an outlet next to the seat to charge it.
Collins announced, “Auyán Tepui, right ahead. Can’t miss it.”
Brodie and Taylor looked out the windshield at the massive tabletop mountain, its east-facing escarpment lit yellow by the rising sun. Its peak reached at least a couple hundred feet above their altitude, and clouds ringed the upper edges of the tepui, obscuring its summit. Stretching in all directions from the foot of the mountain was endless, dense jungle, threaded by small tributaries of the Orinoco Basin.
Taylor said, “This is breathtaking.”
Brodie agreed, “They don’t make them like that any more.”
Taylor took a few pictures with her smartphone, and Brodie hoped he didn’t have to see a slideshow in her apartment.
Collins continued his guided tour. “There’s a valley cutting into the north side of the tepui called Devil’s Canyon, and the falls drop from the canyon’s western wall, which will be on our right. So Angel Falls drops into Devil’s Canyon.” He thought that was funny—right up there with Tommy Can You Hear Us?
Brodie stared at the tepui and thought about Carmen, who maybe flew to Kavak, maybe went upriver for an hour, maybe got off on the right bank, and maybe walked fifteen minutes to Mercer’s camp.
What had felt like solid information in Caracas was starting to feel a little sketchy in the presence of Venezuela’s enormous hinterlands.
Collins continued his climb as they approached the tepui to make sure the Cessna and the mountain did not meet.
Taylor asked, “Can you land a plane up there?”
“You can, but it’s prohibited now.” He added, “Back in Jimmie Angel’s day, back in the Thirties, you could do whatever you wanted.”
“Those were the days,” said Brodie. “Who’s Jimmie Angel?”
“American aviator and explorer. He flew here looking for gold.”
“How’d he make out?”
“He landed on Auyán Tepui with his wife, and his plane got stuck in the mud. He and his wife had to climb down and find the nearest settlement.”
“How long did that marriage last?”
Collins chuckled and continued his tour spiel. “The plane stayed up there for over thirty years before it was brought down and put on display in front of Tomás de Heres Airport.”
“So did he find gold?”
“No. But he got the falls named after him. Angel Falls.” Collins added, “Better than gold. That’s immortality.”
More like a consolation prize. Well, thought Brodie, that might be the story of human exploration—looking for one thing and finding another. Looking for gold and finding a waterfall. Looking for the fountain of youth and immortality and finding death. The great cosmic joke.
Collins said, “The indigenous people say the gods live on top of the tepuis.”
Well, thought Brodie, they damn sure didn’t live in the mountains surrounding Caracas.
They flew in silence for a few minutes, and Brodie could see Devil’s Canyon, which was a few miles wide and mostly in shadow at this early hour. Thick jungle filled the valley and climbed up the base of the tepui’s sheer rock walls.
As they descended into the canyon, they saw the towering waterfall on their right, its source obscured by clouds, making the water appear to be tumbling out of the sky as it cascaded down the steep face of the tepui, plunging thousands of feet into a river below that cut through the valley’s jungle floor.
Brodie thought about Kyle Mercer, who was down there somewhere. Captain Mercer’s journey had taken him from the dead mountains of Afghanistan to here, the dwelling place of the gods. Could this place